Well, I once said that John Walker only wrote about one mission and nothing else. HIs books used to be fairly simple and straightforward. Not any more! I suppose that’s good because this book is very, very interesting, but also very confusing. It has so many parts that are going on at the same time. While he usually switches gears with each chapter, that’s not always the case in this book.
As you have read, we have two main characters, Sam Levine and Aldo Cassidy, who have basically changed bodies! Yeah, I don’t know how to explain that better. The original Sam was a criminal and had just pulled a job for the Constance family, a very big crime family. Only the job he pulled wasn’t done exactly according to their wants so he had to make himself scarce or he might not have lived much longer. Aldo was a rich guy who had just been drafted into the army, but he certainly didn’t want to go and was doing what was necessary to get out of serving. When they switched identities, Sam became Aldo and went and joined the Army as a 2nd Lieutenant while Aldo now become a wanted man trying to hid out from just about everybody. I did say this was confusing. Don’t start this series without reading book 1.
Anyway, Aldo has now been on several Army mission and has a team with him that seems to be working pretty well. He’s been assigned to the *Arden*, a Navy ship under a Captain Risler (Navy). She and her ship have been trying to help some nobles establish a treaty with the Talmar, and alien race that the humanity has had on again and off again trouble with. The nobles believe that the two races need to ban together in order to face the Gorlan. This is definitely an alien race that has been indiscriminately attacking and destroying human and Talmar colonies. These Gorlan don’t take prisoners, but just kill and destroy everything on a planet and then move on. They don’t even take the planet for themselves. They also have never communicated with the humans or the Talmar.
Meanwhile Sam has joined up with Shep, the computer expert, and they have traveled to the planet Constance to explain their actions to someone of the Constance family hoping that they will let them work off any problems versus just kill them outright. That doesn’t seem like a very good idea, but it’s the only thing they can do right now. Security Corps is also looking for them and that would definitely put them in a prison if they were caught by them.
And while all of this is going on, there are political maneuverings by several other players to include the Crown Prince. The way humanity has set itself up is with a King and Queen plus the Nobility that comes from that. They are what the majority of the human civilization look to for governance. Yet, these people are only figure-heads and don’t really have much power. The Board of Directors (BoD) which seems to consist of powerful and wealthy business people actually run everything. The BoD determines what policies are going to instituted throughout the human empire and they certainly do so without consulting with the King and Queen. How this all works is something of a mystery, but the BoD is all about profit. They don’t even recognize the potential destruction of everything if the Gorlan attack.
Then there’s the cops and robbers story line. Justiciar Caden Raines and his partner, Sarina, were initially chasing Sam Levine, but were re-directed by their boss to find Jenna Oslow, daughter of one of the BoD who was kidnapped by her supposedly friends and taken to Constance to see if they could get the Constance family’s help in their effort to get a treaty with the Talmar. That didn’t work so well, but Jenna was smart enough to escape and meet Justiciar Raines as he was closing in on the ship that had taken her to Constance. They escaped the planet in the ship only to fall into a trap set by pirates.
Then, back to Aldo who has been promoted to Captain (Army). His team aboard the *Arden* have arrived in orbit around a Talmar planet that appears to have just been attacked by the Gorlan. He and his team are sent down to see if they can find any survivors which they do know are on the planet, but not exactly where. This doesn’t seem like a difficult task since the Gorlan have left until that is when they return. That’s something the Gorlan have never done, return to an already destroyed planet. So why are they back and how fast can Aldo and his team get off this planet? If they can’t, then they’ll die. The same goes for the ship. It can’t fight against a Gorlan ship since the Gorlan have much more advanced technology. Their best defense is to leave but should or will they do so without their ground forces?
As I said a lot going on in this book. It’s very interesting so you won’t waste time just reading through stuff, but each thing leads to another. I think at some point all of these characters are going to meet to do something, but I can’t guess at what. More will be written in book 5, “Criminal Oaths”, now available on Amazon.